Kevin O'Leary: Warming not a partisan issue – it's physics

As Southern California shivers in record low temperatures, extreme weather ravages the globe. Australia melts in another summer of blistering heat and fires, Britain endures near-biblical rains and floods, China freezes in its bitterest winter in 30 years and snow blankets Jerusalem. Climate change is not just about heat; it's about more frequent and intense weather gyrations. In the United States, 2012 was the hottest year in recorded history with the farm belt drought, killer tornados and Superstorm Sandy costing tens of billions of dollars.

On the Mississippi River, the water level is so low that the Army Corps of Engineers may have to halt the cargo barges that move millions of tons of cargo annually. What would Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer say about Ol' Man River drying up?

Unfortunately, it is only going to get worse as we roar ahead with our fossil fuel economy. Domestic temperatures are projected to rise another 2 to 4 degrees Fahrenheit in the next several decades, according to the new National Climate Assessment, released Friday. If you think California has economic problems now, just wait. Picture life with a diminished Sierra snow pack: water shortages across the Southland and the end of California agriculture as the nation's breadbasket and vineyard.

It is increasingly clear that we are facing an emergency. The climate deniers can speak, yell and scream at Mother Nature all they want, but she is not listening.

We need a bipartisan approach to climate change similar to what existed during the 40-year Cold War. Slowing the pace of climate deterioration and stabilizing what is now a torrent of CO2 pouring into the atmosphere requires a similar national focus and effort to what it took to defeat the Soviet Empire. Before World War II, American foreign policy was divided with isolationists staunchly opposed to America's involvement overseas. But Pearl Harbor and Hitler changed all that. And when Soviet communism became the new threat, our bipartisan consensus made clear we would do whatever it took to defend freedom and defeat the Evil Empire.

Global warming is not a partisan issue. It is simple physics – an unfortunate side effect of industrial society. Because CO2 emissions are ubiquitous, invisible and global, our predicament can seem insurmountable. It is not. It is a question of accurate pricing, changing bad habits and letting the market work.

Instead of fouling our nest, we must to recognize that the earth is a closed system. For too long, we have acted as if the invisible pollution coming out of automobile tailpipes, coal plant smokestacks and airline jet engines disappears when it floats up into the clear blue sky. For decades no one knew that burning gasoline, diesel fuel and coal was literally changing the atmosphere. The Earth was so large that we could not believe that we were altering the natural environment. We were wrong.

Fossil fuels – oil, coal and natural gas – have been a terrific source of power for 150 years. However, if we burn all the proven reserves we will cook the planet. Literally.

In 2013, we must accelerate the switch to alternative fuels and cleaner-burning fossil fuels by insisting that the price of global warming be included in the price of petroleum and coal. What was an externality that everyone conveniently ignored must now be internalized. Yes, this means the price of fossil fuels will go up. If they remain artificially cheap, we will continue to play Dr. Kevorkian to the planet. Internalizing their true costs, a tax on carbon consumption, will make alternative energy affordable and encourage its rapid development.

As Michael Brune, executive director of the Sierra Club, told NPR last week, "If we really want to stop the droughts, wildfires and superstorms, we're going to have to accelerate the pace that we move off of all fossil fuels." Doing that is going to take a Cold War-type effort. Similar to facing the Soviet threat, it's not a matter of cost – it is something we have to do. As the earth begins to play Mr. Toad's Wild Ride on a weekly basis, the time to act is now.

It is time for conservatives to have a "Nixon goes to China" moment on the climate issue. Richard Nixon was a politician who built his career as an ardent anti-Communist, only to recognize as president the importance of establishing relations with Communist China. Nixon's decision changed history for the better. A new generation of Republicans must do the same.

Kevin O'Leary is a journalist and political scientist at the Center for the Study of Democracy at UC Irvine.

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